Re: Bug#191717: automake1.6: install-sh licensing nightmare?

[Branden Robinson]

On Wed, May 07, 2003 at 01:15:41PM -0400, Anthony DeRobertis wrote:
> Yes, that's the argument. See the first paragraph under the quoted 
> material, which reads in part:
> "...but it also automatically installs a copy of install-sh
>  into automake-using packages when --add-missing is used.  The
>  authors of these other software packages are almost certainly
>  not aware of this clause in the install-sh license and how it
>  affects their programs."

Okay, well, it sounds like Eric Dorland has the situation under control.

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|  "I came, I saw, she conquered."
Debian GNU/Linux   |  The original Latin seems to have
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |  been garbled.
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |  -- Robert Heinlein


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Re: Bug#189164: libdbd-mysql-perl uses GPL lib, may be used by GPL-incompatible apps

[Branden Robinson]

On Wed, May 07, 2003 at 01:12:09PM -0400, Anthony DeRobertis wrote:
> On Wednesday, May 7, 2003, at 01:50 AM, Branden Robinson wrote:
> 
> >Or are you wanting to restrict the problem domain to cases where an
> >interface innovated in a GPLed library hasn't been cloned yet?
> 
> Given:
>   1) Library GPLLib is under the GPL
>   2) Perl module Iface provides an interface to various implementations
>  of similar features, and the user selects which implementation to
> use
>   3) Perl modules PM uses GPLLib to implement Iface
>   4) Perl program P is under a GPL-incompatible license
> 
> Question:
> Is is permissible for P to use PM through Iface?

I would say yes, and I think that 2) is the critical issue.

Without 2), this procedure looks like an effort to create a Perl module
Iface which is a shim to let other programs P make themselves infrining
derivatives of GPLLib.

But with 2), this procedure looks like an effort to create an
abstraction layer Iface, which is a shim to let other programs P
interoperate with a de-facto standard.  Programs P cannot *necessarily*
be derivative works of GPLLlib in this scenario, and therefore such
programs are not *necessarily* infringing of the GNU GPL at the time
they are distributed.

This is my opinion, and I cannot claim to speak for the FSF, but the
above sounds exactly like the libreadline/libeditline situation to me,
and to my knowledge the FSF has never gone after people who *weren't*
using libreadline-as-libreadline with a GPL-incompatible application.
NcFTP is an example of a program that did just that, according to the
FSF.

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|   The software said it required
Debian GNU/Linux   |   Windows 3.1 or better, so I
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |   installed Linux.
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |


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Re: Proposed statement wrt GNU FDL

[Don Armstrong]

On Thu, 08 May 2003, Anthony Towns wrote:
> As far as I know, we're happy to accept non-free stuff in pristine
> .orig.tar.gz's as long as it's not used.

I'd actually expect apt-get source foo to return sources that are DFSG
free, when foo is in main or contrib.

Granted, you should be checking the licenses of any source that you
use before you use it, but I would assume many of us expect all of the
software and sources in main to be free under the DFSG.

> If you don't have a pristine .orig.tar.gz anyway, then it's silly to
> include unused non-free stuff, but it's not cause for a REJECT.

But it seems strange (to me anyway) that an ftp-master would be
finding this out in a situation where a maintainer didn't already know
about it. Either someone didn't look over the code and licenses when
they were packaging, didn't examine the diff between versions, was
otherwise unaware of what they were uploading, or knew and didn't have
time to do anything abou it.


Don Armstrong

-- 
Miracles had become relative common-places since the advent of
entheogens; it now took very unusual circumstances to attract public
attention to sightings of supernatural entities. The latest miracle
had raised the ante on the supernatural: the Virgin Mary had
manifested herself to two children, a dog, and a Public Telepresence
Point.

-- Bruce Sterling, _Holy Fire_ p228

http://www.donarmstrong.com
http://www.anylevel.com
http://rzlab.ucr.edu


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Re: Proposed statement wrt GNU FDL

[Anthony Towns]

On Thu, May 08, 2003 at 06:07:10AM +1000, Anthony Towns wrote:
> As far as I know, we're happy to accept non-free stuff in pristine
> .orig.tar.gz's as long as it's not used. 

Okay, so this is wrong. You're not allowed to include non-free stuff in
anything uploaded to main, .deb, .diff.gz or .orig.tar.gz.

Cheers,
aj

-- 
Anthony Towns <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> 
I don't speak for anyone save myself. GPG signed mail preferred.

  ``Dear Anthony Towns: [...] Congratulations -- 
you are now certified as a Red Hat Certified Engineer!''


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Re: LPPL and non-discrimination

[Richard Braakman]

On Wed, May 07, 2003 at 09:52:46AM -0400, Peter S Galbraith wrote:
> Didn't the QPL used to have this exact feature?
> It was considered free at the time, wasn't it?

The NPL (Netscape Public License; parts of Mozilla still use it) has
this feature.  Check out part V of the Additional Terms:

  V. Use of Modifications and Covered Code by Initial Developer.
   V.1. In General.
   The obligations of Section 3 apply to Netscape, except to
   the extent specified in this Amendment, Section V.2 and V.3.

   V.2. Other Products.
   Netscape may include Covered Code in products other than the
   Netscape's Branded Code which are released by Netscape
   during the two (2) years following the release date of the
   Original Code, without such additional products becoming
   subject to the terms of this License, and may license such
   additional products on different terms from those contained
   in this License.

   V.3. Alternative Licensing.
   Netscape may license the Source Code of Netscape's Branded
   Code, including Modifications incorporated therein, without
   such Netscape Branded Code becoming subject to the terms of
   this License, and may license such Netscape Branded Code on
   different terms from those contained in this License.
 
(The Section 3 referred to in V.1 is about distribution of modified
versions; it also contains the copyleft clauses.)

The NPL makes me want to add a "License must not be overly verbose"
clause to the DFSG...

Richard Braakman

Re: various opinions on Debian vs the GFDL

[Anthony Towns]

On Wed, May 07, 2003 at 12:58:20PM -0400, Anthony DeRobertis wrote:
> On Tuesday, May 6, 2003, at 10:03 AM, Anthony Towns wrote:
> >you should be able to do a
> >text representation of a FFT or something, I would've thought. Long,
> >and ugly, but editable as text,
> That's no better than a hex dump of the PCM data. 

So? The phrases "hex dump" and "PCM data" don't appear in the GFDL. And
I'm not saying that this is good, or ideal, just that it's feasible
and allowed.

> It's not any more 
> editable in a text editor (possibly, quite less) than a hex dump of an 
> ELF object. 

Sure it is. I can tell you how to change:



to a "D" just by guessing. Are you claiming to be too stupid to be able to
do the same?

The requirement in the GFDL is simply this: 

* machine-readable copy
* format whose specification is available to the general public
* format that is sutiable for revising the document straightforwardly
  with generic text editors [or irrelevant alternatives]
* format this is suitable for input to text formatters or for automatic
  translation to a variety of formats suitable for input to
  text formatters
* format with markup that has not been arranged to thwart or discourage
  subsequent modification by readers
* [irrelevant remark about image formats]

An XML score satisfies all these requirements as a way of representing music.

> _Technically_ it's editable. Practically, it's not 

No, you're wrong. An XML score is trivially and straightforwardly
editable, both technically and practically, and it's a perfectly
reasonable way of writing down music.

Samples and recordings are more difficult, mainly because the concept of
"revision" doesn't really exist, per se. One possibility is just to do
a hex dump -- it's as straightforwardly editable with a hex editor as
_anything_ is, after all. Another possibility is to create a fancy XML
format, something like:


2231df4ed32234ed8543a33b3bbb4567853...


Simply being able to cut up the sound and insert your own pre-recorded sound
effects is probably enough to satisfy that requirement actually -- so a format
that looks like:

1234123412341234123414523546356473
1345234529034234856734750491094385109
138419235189457135092358904851
1238457127341590189045739047590273490576

that you can easily cut up and replace with a text editor seems perfectly
legitimate to me.

* it's machine readable
* writing a specification and publishing it seems straightforward -
  a hexdumped wav, with a small XML wrapper, eg
* you can revise it with a text editor easily enough -- changing it
  to be "is Anthony My name" is easy, eg; and there's no requirement
  for arbitrary modifications to be easy or straightforward
* you can certainly change the format automatically easily
* the format's been designed to make it as easy as possible to modify,
  not arranged to thward anything

> "...suitable for revising the document STRAIGHTFORWARDLY with generic 
> text editors..."

Yes.

> Even editing MIDI-esque XML with a text editor wouldn't be all that 
> straightforward.

Sure it would. See above. Arrange for your format to have clear textual
beat markers at timed intervals, instead of word intervals if you like.

> They allow images to be edited with image editors; drawings to be 
> edited with drawing programs; text files to be edited with text 
> editors; why not sounds with sound editors?

Because they didn't think of it, or because they're stupid. It's not a
good license, and it's not a good requirement, but that does not make
it non-free.

> And, what about video? Are we supposed to edit that with text editors, 
> too?

If you want to include it in a GNU FDL document, or if you want to
license it under the GNU FDL, yes. Although, you could claim that video
fits under "images composed of pixels" and thus must be revisable with
a generic paint program.

The questions at hand here are can you license sound stuff under the
GNU FDL, and, if not, can the GNU FDL possible be DFSG-free. I think
the answer to the first question is yes, and, even ignoring that, I'm
not really convinced the answer to the second is no.

Cheers,
aj

-- 
Anthony Towns <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> 
I don't speak for anyone save myself. GPG signed mail preferred.

  ``Dear Anthony Towns: [...] Congratulations -- 
you are now certified as a Red Hat Certified Engineer!''


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Re: LPPL and non-discrimination

[Anthony Towns]

On Wed, May 07, 2003 at 12:32:04PM -0400, Jeremy Hankins wrote:
> Anthony Towns  writes:
> >> Must modifications be under the ABC-DFL?  If so, it's non-free because
> >> to modify it you must agree that ABC can use your code in their
> >> proprietary stuff.  
> > Uh, no, that's not the case.
> Why not?  A license like the GPL, but with a clause requiring that Foo
> Inc. have the right to relicense any derivative works as they please
> is DFSG free?

I'm not sure that's particularly like the GPL, but yes, it is.

DFSG-free means that it can be included in Debian, maintained by our
maintainers and used by our users. It doesn't mean it's necessarily fair,
or optimal or moral.

Cheers,
aj

-- 
Anthony Towns <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> 
I don't speak for anyone save myself. GPG signed mail preferred.

  ``Dear Anthony Towns: [...] Congratulations -- 
you are now certified as a Red Hat Certified Engineer!''


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Re: Bug#189164: libdbd-mysql-perl uses GPL lib, may be used by GPL-incompatible apps

[Edmund GRIMLEY EVANS]

Anthony DeRobertis <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:

> Given:
>   1) Library GPLLib is under the GPL
>   2) Perl module Iface provides an interface to various implementations
>  of similar features, and the user selects which implementation to
> use
>   3) Perl modules PM uses GPLLib to implement Iface
>   4) Perl program P is under a GPL-incompatible license
> 
> Question:
> Is is permissible for P to use PM through Iface?

Yes, of course, because the GPL doesn't restrict use!

> I argue "yes" because I don't see how P could _possibly_ be held to be 
> a derived worked of GPLLib, and thus is not subject to the GPLs 
> restrictions.

P is not a derived work of GPLLib, but P+GPLLib is likely to be a
derived work of GPLLib, in which case it is not allowed to distribute
them together. However, you could certainly distribute P on its own if
you could reasonably claim that P is useful without GPLLib.

> I further argue that if the answer is "no", there is no good reason to 
> say changing the language from perl to shell script should matter, and 
> thus no GPL-incompatibly licensed program can use GNU grep, ls, etc.

There are other implementations of grep, ls, etc, so it would
certainly be all right to distribute the GPL-incompatible shell script
on its own. Debian would distribute the shell script with GNU grep,
ls, etc, so you'd have to find another argument why the script is a
separate work from grep, ls, etc, which is probably doable if the
script makes relatively minor use of grep, etc to do something
independently interesting, but would be a bit harder if the script
implements a graphical interface to grep.

That's how I see it, anyway.

Edmund

Re: LPPL and non-discrimination

[Glenn Maynard]

On Wed, May 07, 2003 at 12:28:12PM -0400, Jeremy Hankins wrote:
> >> >> Must modifications be under the ABC-DFL?  If so, it's non-free
> >> >> because to modify it you must agree that ABC can use your code in
> >> >> their proprietary stuff.  Is this what you're getting at?
> >
> > What about a license like the GPL, without the source distribution 
> > requirement?
> 
> How is this different from a MIT/BSD license?  The license is free,
> but as distributed (e.g., w/o source) it may not be.

A license that says "modify and distribute all you want; keep my name; don't
add additional restrictions to the license" implicitly requires that you allow
your modifications to be used proprietarily, since it prevents you from adding
the GPL's safeguards against it.  I'd find that license to be obnoxious (and
it'd be incompatible with most other licenses), but it doesn't seem non-free.

-- 
Glenn Maynard

Re: Proposed statement wrt GNU FDL

[Anthony Towns]

On Wed, May 07, 2003 at 01:12:27AM -0500, Branden Robinson wrote:
> I think before Debian puts anything in main it should remove any
> invariant sections from the work, just as we do with non-free source
> code.  I once had a big old nasty flamewar with the FTP admins that
> was tangentially related to this point, but the FTP admins and I agreed
> that having non-free source code in a package's .orig.tar.gz was
> unacceptable even if it wasn't "used for anything" and did not appear in
> any binary packages.

As far as I know, we're happy to accept non-free stuff in pristine
.orig.tar.gz's as long as it's not used. If you don't have a pristine
.orig.tar.gz anyway, then it's silly to include unused non-free stuff,
but it's not cause for a REJECT.

> In other words, invariant sections (small I, small S) are not DFSG-free,
> but the removal of invariant sections from a work may be sufficient to
> render it DSFG-free.

Assuming that's allowed by the license of course. As far as I'm aware, it's
quite okay to do this in either the .diff.gz or debian/rules, though.

Cheers,
aj

-- 
Anthony Towns <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> 
I don't speak for anyone save myself. GPG signed mail preferred.

  ``Dear Anthony Towns: [...] Congratulations -- 
you are now certified as a Red Hat Certified Engineer!''


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Re: Bug#168554: Status of Sarge Release Issues (Updated for May)

[Branden Robinson]

On Wed, May 07, 2003 at 08:29:52AM -, MJ Ray wrote:
> Christian Hammers <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> > On Tue, May 06, 2003 at 07:27:12PM +0200, Andreas Metzler wrote:
> >> Hmm, I think you've got a point, the "just add an OpenSSL exception to
> >> the license" procedure doesn't work if other GPL'ed stuff
> >> (mysql-server) is included.
> > I wrote today with Lenz Grimmer who is the MySQL employee who cares
> > about contact to the distribution maintainers. He told me that he will
> > talk about licence issues with "David" from MySQL at the end of this
> > week.
> 
> Is gnutls a possible alternative for this yet?  It shouldn't cause
> licence problems.

Actually it does.  GNU TLS's OpenSSL compatibility layer is licensed
under the GPL, not the LGPL, last time I checked.  This would cause
problems for at least some works we distribute.

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|   The last Christian died on the
Debian GNU/Linux   |   cross.
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |   -- Friedrich Nietzsche
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |


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Re: PHP-Nuke License Conclusion?

[Branden Robinson]

On Wed, May 07, 2003 at 04:53:03PM +0200, Henning Makholm wrote:
> Scripsit Branden Robinson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> 
> > This point should probably be clarified.  The reason PHP-Nuke was
> > regarded as non-DFSG-free was because the author's additional
> > restriction created, in our opinion, a license that was impossible to
> > satisfy.
> 
> I thought that the reason was that the combined license is simply not
> free, even if one interprets it in a self-consistent way.

That may be, but I think we should be conservative in our rulings.  We
don't have to address the issue of whether the putative license is
DFSG-free if the work in question is de facto not licensed at all.

> > Debian interprets "this License" and "herein" to mean the conditions of
> > the GNU GPL expressed in its text; no more and no less.
> 
> s/Debian/Branden Robinson/

I hadn't noticed any objections to my analysis, so I assumed people were
at least moderately comfortable with it.

If that's not the case, please refresh my memory, or present a critique
now.

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|   The software said it required
Debian GNU/Linux   |   Windows 3.1 or better, so I
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |   installed Linux.
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |


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Re: query from Georg Greve of GNU about Debian's opinion of the FDL

[Branden Robinson]

On Wed, May 07, 2003 at 08:39:51AM -, MJ Ray wrote:
> And now, a short clarification statement:
> I was recently mentioned in a discussion on debian-legal, but the
> cited emails are unpublished. I assure you that I did not claim to
> speak for the Debian project or call the debian-legal list a minority
> opinion.

I don't think anyone made such a charge, so don't worry about it.

-- 
G. Branden Robinson| No math genius, eh?  Then perhaps
Debian GNU/Linux   | you could explain to me where you
[EMAIL PROTECTED] | got these...   PENROSE TILES!
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ | -- Stephen R. Notley


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Re: Bug#191717: automake1.6: install-sh licensing nightmare?

[Anthony DeRobertis]

On Wednesday, May 7, 2003, at 03:53 AM, Branden Robinson wrote:

Is your argument that because of the nature of GNU automake, it might 
be

causing our users to inadvertently infringe MIT's copyright?


Yes, that's the argument. See the first paragraph under the quoted 
material, which reads in part:

"...but it also automatically installs a copy of install-sh
 into automake-using packages when --add-missing is used.  The
 authors of these other software packages are almost certainly
 not aware of this clause in the install-sh license and how it
 affects their programs."

Re: Bug#189164: libdbd-mysql-perl uses GPL lib, may be used by GPL-incompatible apps

[Anthony DeRobertis]

On Wednesday, May 7, 2003, at 01:50 AM, Branden Robinson wrote:


Or are you wanting to restrict the problem domain to cases where an
interface innovated in a GPLed library hasn't been cloned yet?


Given:
1) Library GPLLib is under the GPL
2) Perl module Iface provides an interface to various implementations
   of similar features, and the user selects which implementation to
use
3) Perl modules PM uses GPLLib to implement Iface
4) Perl program P is under a GPL-incompatible license

Question:
Is is permissible for P to use PM through Iface?


I argue "yes" because I don't see how P could _possibly_ be held to be 
a derived worked of GPLLib, and thus is not subject to the GPLs 
restrictions.


I further argue that if the answer is "no", there is no good reason to 
say changing the language from perl to shell script should matter, and 
thus no GPL-incompatibly licensed program can use GNU grep, ls, etc.

Re: various opinions on Debian vs the GFDL

[Anthony DeRobertis]

On Tuesday, May 6, 2003, at 10:03 AM, Anthony Towns wrote:


you should be able to do a
text representation of a FFT or something, I would've thought. Long,
and ugly, but editable as text,


That's no better than a hex dump of the PCM data. It's not any more 
editable in a text editor (possibly, quite less) than a hex dump of an 
ELF object. _Technically_ it's editable. Practically, it's not --- and 
that's what matters for the GFDL.



 and satisfying the terms of the GNU FDL
as far as I can see.


"...suitable for revising the document STRAIGHTFORWARDLY with generic 
text editors..."


Even editing MIDI-esque XML with a text editor wouldn't be all that 
straightforward.


They allow images to be edited with image editors; drawings to be 
edited with drawing programs; text files to be edited with text 
editors; why not sounds with sound editors?


And, what about video? Are we supposed to edit that with text editors, 
too?




I'm not claiming anyone would /want/ to distribute sound this way, but 
the

fact that you /can/ means this doesn't make GNU FDL docs non-free, IMO.


Making people jump through unreasonable hoops to modify a document 
isn't, IMO, free.

Re: LPPL and non-discrimination

[Jeremy Hankins]

Anthony Towns  writes:
> On Tue, May 06, 2003 at 03:39:19PM -0400, Jeremy Hankins wrote:

>> Must modifications be under the ABC-DFL?  If so, it's non-free because
>> to modify it you must agree that ABC can use your code in their
>> proprietary stuff.  
>
> Uh, no, that's not the case.
>
> Cheers,
> aj

Why not?  A license like the GPL, but with a clause requiring that Foo
Inc. have the right to relicense any derivative works as they please
is DFSG free?  One or the other of us is not understanding something
(quite possibly me, of course).

-- 
Jeremy Hankins <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
PGP fingerprint: 748F 4D16 538E 75D6 8333  9E10 D212 B5ED 37D0 0A03

Re: LPPL and non-discrimination

[Jeremy Hankins]

Glenn Maynard <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> On Tue, May 06, 2003 at 07:34:21PM -0400, Jeremy Hankins wrote:

>> >> Must modifications be under the ABC-DFL?  If so, it's non-free
>> >> because to modify it you must agree that ABC can use your code in
>> >> their proprietary stuff.  Is this what you're getting at?
>
> What about a license like the GPL, without the source distribution 
> requirement?

How is this different from a MIT/BSD license?  The license is free,
but as distributed (e.g., w/o source) it may not be.

-- 
Jeremy Hankins <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
PGP fingerprint: 748F 4D16 538E 75D6 8333  9E10 D212 B5ED 37D0 0A03

Re: PHP-Nuke License Conclusion?

[Steve Langasek]

On Wed, May 07, 2003 at 04:53:03PM +0200, Henning Makholm wrote:

> > This point should probably be clarified.  The reason PHP-Nuke was
> > regarded as non-DFSG-free was because the author's additional
> > restriction created, in our opinion, a license that was impossible to
> > satisfy.

> I thought that the reason was that the combined license is simply not
> free, even if one interprets it in a self-consistent way.

> > Debian interprets "this License" and "herein" to mean the conditions of
> > the GNU GPL expressed in its text; no more and no less.

> s/Debian/Branden Robinson/

Quite.  I don't believe there was any consensus that the license was
inconsistent, just that it was a) non-free, and b) not compatible with
other GPL software.

-- 
Steve Langasek
postmodern programmer


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Re: PHP-Nuke License Conclusion?

[Henning Makholm]

Scripsit Branden Robinson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

> This point should probably be clarified.  The reason PHP-Nuke was
> regarded as non-DFSG-free was because the author's additional
> restriction created, in our opinion, a license that was impossible to
> satisfy.

I thought that the reason was that the combined license is simply not
free, even if one interprets it in a self-consistent way.

> Debian interprets "this License" and "herein" to mean the conditions of
> the GNU GPL expressed in its text; no more and no less.

s/Debian/Branden Robinson/

-- 
Henning Makholm "Det er du nok fandens ene om at
 mene. For det ligger i Australien!"

Re: LPPL and non-discrimination

[Brian T. Sniffen]

Jonathan Fine <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:

> I think that there may have been a misunderstanding,
> caused by an ambiguity in the term "free software".
>
> (Now there's a surprise.)
>
> Once it has been clarified, I think that there will
> be more agreement.
>
> So let's try.
>
> 1.  Software is executables, source files, etc.

You're going to get yourself into trouble if you go much further here:
defining software both accurately and precisely is very, very hard.

> 2.  The copyright holder can license the software
> to third parties.
>
> 3.  Licensed software is free, according to the
> Debian Guidelines, if:
> a)  the license meets the Debian Free Software
> Guidelines.
> b)  the software is available as unobfuscated
> source, and not encumbered by patents or the like.

(b) is reducible to (a).  That is, anything which complies with the
DFSG will be modifiable and redistributable, so it must exist in a
clear, modifiable format without legal encumbrance.

> 4.  The copyright holder can license software under
> both free and proprietary licenses, if he/she wishes
> to.
>
> So ABC Software can if they wish release the software
> they have written under a license that is Debian Free
> (call it DFL) and a proprietary license also (call it
> ABC-PL).
>
> Typically, the ABC-PL will cost money, and will allow
> creation of non-free derived works.

Typically, the ABC-DFL will also allow creation of non-free derived
works.  For example, the BSD and MIT/X11 licenses both allow creation
of non-free derived works by any party.  The prohibition against
creating non-free derived works is not a characteristic of free
licenses, but of copyleft licenses.  Most copyleft licenses happen to
be free licenses as well.

> So far, I think we have agreement.

With some exceptions and clarifications, yes.

> My concern is with the Debian Free License, and the
> non-dsicrimination guideline.

I think you might understand more if you broadened your concern to
look at Debian's process of accepting software (from ITP to upload) as
a whole, and the role debian-legal and the DFSG play in that process.

> Suppose ABC Software takes a DFL and from it creates
> a new license (call it ABC-DFL) by adding the clause:
>>   If the licensee is ABC Software Inc then the licensee
>>   may freely incorporate this work into its proprietary
>>   software.
>
> My question is this:  Does this ABC-DFL license meet the
> Debian Free Software Guidelines?

Yes.  Maybe.

If this is the MIT/X11 license, for example, the addition of your
candidate paragraph does not make it non-free.  Indeed, for almost
every non-copyleft license, this paragraph may be freely added: it
imposes no restriction on anybody other than ABC Software.

If DFL is a copyleft license, though, this is probably non-free.  It
imposes a cost to distribute modifications.

This is very hard to talk about, because licenses aren't modular: each
restriction or grant of permission ties into all the others.  I don't
think you can use an abstract "DFL" for this sort of conversation.
This seems like a weighty proposition now, but for any particular
example plugged in for DFL (CAL, GPL, MPL, BSD, etc), the question is
either a very clear "Free", a very clear "Non-Free, for reasons other
than discrimination" or a very clear "That's nonsense."

> This is a question, of course, about the working of the
> non-discrimination guideline.

Partly... but when similar licenses have been proposed in the past,
they've been rejected for failure to permit free distribution of
modifications, not for unfair discrimination.  I don't think you're going
to be able to put together an example where bias towards the copyright
holder involves the discrimination clause.  The discrimination clause
is more commonly used to prohibit software which is licensed as, for
example, "MIT/X11, but only if you do no work involving a nuclear
power plant" or "Free for non-commercial use only."

-Brian 

-- 
Brian T. Sniffen [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://www.evenmere.org/~bts/

Re: Bug#191717: automake1.6: install-sh licensing nightmare?

[Eric Dorland]

I've already contacted upstream privately about this and he is all
over it. They will either rewrite it from scratch, or perhaps update
the licensing terms since it seems at one point install.sh was
distributed later on in X11R6 without these licensing terms. I'll keep
you posted.

* Branden Robinson ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) wrote:
> On Fri, May 02, 2003 at 11:21:18PM -0400, Matt Zimmerman wrote:
> > Package: automake1.6
> > Version: 1.6.3-5
> > Severity: serious
> > 
> > I noticed this from a discussion in #148412 about gimp's licensing)
> 
> [snip standard MIT/X11 copyright notice and license]
> 
> > Not only does automake not reproduce these notices in its documentation, as
> > required, but it also automatically installs a copy of install-sh into
> > automake-using packages when --add-missing is used.  The authors of these
> > other software packages are almost certainly not aware of this clause in the
> > install-sh license and how it affects their programs.
> > 
> > This problem also applies to automake1.4, and probably all other versions as
> > well.
> 
> Perhaps I'm being dense, but what do you want debian-legal to do about
> this?  Clearly the authors of GNU Automake should get right with
> licensing, but until and unless Debian is threatened by representatives
> of MIT I don't think there's a reason to panic.
> 
> This issue should be brought to the attention of the automake upstream
> maintainer(s).  That's a simple courtesy.  I do not think it is Debian's
> job to enforce other people's copyrights.  Our only responsibilities in
> this matter are to take reasonable steps to guard ourselves and our
> users from copyright infringement liability.
> 
> Is your argument that because of the nature of GNU automake, it might be
> causing our users to inadvertently infringe MIT's copyright?  If so,
> that is indeed more serious, and the bug should be fixed by the Debian
> maintainer.
> 
> Alternatively, we could just get someone to write a work-alike of MIT's
> install program, place it into the public domain, and replace the one in
> GNU automake with that.  I mean, come on, it's *install*.  It ain't
> hard.
> 



-- 
Eric Dorland <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
ICQ: #61138586, Jabber: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
1024D/16D970C6 097C 4861 9934 27A0 8E1C  2B0A 61E9 8ECF 16D9 70C6

-BEGIN GEEK CODE BLOCK-
Version: 3.12
GCS d- s++: a-- C+++ UL+++ P++ L++ E++ W++ N+ o K- w+ 
O? M++ V-- PS+ PE Y+ PGP++ t++ 5++ X+ R tv++ b+++ DI+ D+ 
G e h! r- y+ 
--END GEEK CODE BLOCK--

Re: LPPL and non-discrimination

[Peter S Galbraith]

Jeremy Hankins <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:

> Jonathan Fine <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> 
> > My concern is with the Debian Free License, and the
> > non-dsicrimination guideline.
> >
> > Suppose ABC Software takes a DFL and from it creates
> > a new license (call it ABC-DFL) by adding the clause:
> >>   If the licensee is ABC Software Inc then the licensee
> >>   may freely incorporate this work into its proprietary
> >>   software.
> >
> > My question is this:  Does this ABC-DFL license meet the
> > Debian Free Software Guidelines?
> 
> Must modifications be under the ABC-DFL?  If so, it's non-free because
> to modify it you must agree that ABC can use your code in their
> proprietary stuff.  Is this what you're getting at?
> 
> Otherwise, it's free, afaict.

Didn't the QPL used to have this exact feature?
It was considered free at the time, wasn't it?

Re: Legal questions about some GNU Emacs files

[Jérôme Marant]

En réponse à Branden Robinson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:

> 1) Documentation *is* software; and
> 2) The Debian Project treats documentation as software for the
> purposes
>of interpreting our Social Contract and the Debian Free Software
>Guidelines.
> 
> I do not believe the former.  I do believe the latter.

Can a manifesto be considered as documentation? And more
generaly, what about verbatiml texts?

--
Jérôme Marant <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
  <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>

http://marant.org

Re: [OT] Droit d'auteur vs. free software?

[Henning Makholm]

Scripsit Branden Robinson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> On Fri, May 02, 2003 at 08:11:02PM +0200, Henning Makholm wrote:

> > It is stupid if they released their software under a free license
> > without realizing what freedom means.

> Well, the realization of "what freedom means" does in fact appear to be
> escaping some advocates of the GNU FDL...

Point taken.

-- 
Henning Makholm"What a hideous colour khaki is."

Re: query from Georg Greve of GNU about Debian's opinion of the FDL

[MJ Ray]

-BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-
Hash: SHA1

And now, a short clarification statement:
I was recently mentioned in a discussion on debian-legal, but the
cited emails are unpublished. I assure you that I did not claim to
speak for the Debian project or call the debian-legal list a minority
opinion. I did say that I could find no Debian policy about GFDL and
that is how the message to debian-legal should be interpreted. I
apologise for any confusion.

And now, for something completely different:
- --
MJR
-BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-
Version: GnuPG v1.2.1 (GNU/Linux)

iD8DBQE+uMYxmUY5euFC5vQRArZFAJ4uvsDi1HVptqi05RbuLpKx6TyMiQCguNDO
86HLEh69uObcIJuAGnSQ17E=
=dva6
-END PGP SIGNATURE-

Re: Legal questions about some GNU Emacs files

[John Holroyd]

On Wed, 2003-05-07 at 07:21, Branden Robinson wrote:
> On Tue, Apr 29, 2003 at 05:59:31PM +1000, Anthony Towns wrote:
> > You might like to consider some of the other documents accompanying
> > WHY-FREE, and their relevance to emacs or Debian.

> It looks like RMS used to use the official GNU Emacs distribution in a
> similar manner to the one in which he uses his personal webpage today.
> 
>   http://www.stallman.org/
> 
> I'll note that I find myself in sympathy with much of the material on
> that webpage.  I just don't think most of it's germane to software
> distribution, and I do not think it is -- neighborly -- to attach
> unremovable, unmodifiable activist literature to software distributions
> and call the product "free as in freedom".

I think that's a reasonable comment. 
The offending literature, should be de-bundled from the package and life
goes on as normal for us all.

Has anybody asked RMS if he is willing to do this?  

-- 
John Holroyd <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Demos Technosis Ltd


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Re: Bug#168554: Status of Sarge Release Issues (Updated for May)

[MJ Ray]

Christian Hammers <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> On Tue, May 06, 2003 at 07:27:12PM +0200, Andreas Metzler wrote:
>> Hmm, I think you've got a point, the "just add an OpenSSL exception to
>> the license" procedure doesn't work if other GPL'ed stuff
>> (mysql-server) is included.
> I wrote today with Lenz Grimmer who is the MySQL employee who cares
> about contact to the distribution maintainers. He told me that he will
> talk about licence issues with "David" from MySQL at the end of this
> week.

Is gnutls a possible alternative for this yet?  It shouldn't cause
licence problems.

-- 
MJR

Re: Legal questions about some GNU Emacs files

[Branden Robinson]

On Wed, May 07, 2003 at 05:29:25PM +1000, Matthew Palmer wrote:
> On Wed, 7 May 2003, Branden Robinson wrote:
> 
> > On Tue, Apr 29, 2003 at 12:48:20PM +1000, Matthew Palmer wrote:
> > > * Whether it is useful or not as a DFWWWDG-free item is not at issue.  If 
> > > it
> > > is not free as we define it, Debian will not distribute it.
> > 
> > ...in "main", anyway...
> 
> Hair well split.  Would you have preferred "will not be a part of the Debian
> distribution"?

It's more accurate, and makes us look less hypocritical.

Of course, the best way to avoid the perception of hypocrisy is to stop
distributing non-free...

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|It was a typical net.exercise -- a
Debian GNU/Linux   |screaming mob pounding on a greasy
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |spot on the pavement, where used to
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |lie the carcass of a dead horse.


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Re: Proposed statement wrt GNU FDL

[Branden Robinson]

On Wed, May 07, 2003 at 08:48:26AM +0200, Josselin Mouette wrote:
> Le mer 07/05/2003 à 08:12, Branden Robinson a écrit :
> > I think before Debian puts anything in main it should remove any
> > invariant sections from the work, just as we do with non-free source
> > code.  I once had a big old nasty flamewar with the FTP admins that
> > was tangentially related to this point, but the FTP admins and I agreed
> > that having non-free source code in a package's .orig.tar.gz was
> > unacceptable even if it wasn't "used for anything" and did not appear in
> > any binary packages.
> 
> By removing invariant sections, don't we simply violate the GFDL ?

Only if the work is licensed under the GNU FDL in the first place[1].

You appear to have ignored or misunderstood the meaning of my second
paragraph, which you did not quote.

> > In other words, invariant sections (small I, small S) are not DFSG-free,
> > but the removal of invariant sections from a work may be sufficient to
> > render it DSFG-free.

[1] or other terms which forbid the removal of pieces of the work

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|  The National Security Agency is
Debian GNU/Linux   |  working on the Fourth Amendment
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |  thing.
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |  -- Phil Lago, Deputy XD, CIA


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Re: PHP-Nuke License Conclusion?

[Branden Robinson]

On Sun, May 04, 2003 at 04:44:39PM -0500, Steve Langasek wrote:
> The copyright holder of a work is free to license the work under the
> terms of his choosing.  Although the PHP-Nuke author has stated the work
> is under the GPL, he imposes the additional restriction (one which we
> believe is NOT part of the GPL normally) to display credits on every web
> page output by the software.  As such, the consensus on debian-legal is
> that PHP-Nuke does not comply with the DFSG and should not be included
> in Debian's main archive.

This point should probably be clarified.  The reason PHP-Nuke was
regarded as non-DFSG-free was because the author's additional
restriction created, in our opinion, a license that was impossible to
satisfy.  Sections 6 and 7 of the GNU GPL say:

  6.  Each time you redistribute the Program (or any work based on the
  Program), the recipient automatically receives a license from the
  original licensor to copy, distribute or modify the Program subject to
  these terms and conditions. You may not impose any further
  restrictions on the recipients' exercise of the rights granted herein.
  You are not responsible for enforcing compliance by third parties to
  this License.

  7. If, as a consequence of a court judgment or allegation of patent
  infringement or for any other reason (not limited to patent issues),
  conditions are imposed on you (whether by court order, agreement or
  otherwise) that contradict the conditions of this License, they do not
  excuse you from the conditions of this License. If you cannot
  distribute so as to satisfy simultaneously your obligations under this
  License and any other pertinent obligations, then as a consequence you
  may not distribute the Program at all.

Debian interprets "this License" and "herein" to mean the conditions of
the GNU GPL expressed in its text; no more and no less.  We interpreted
the PHP-Nuke author's additional restriction as just that, with the
consequences you'd expect from the above.  In our assessment, PHP-Nuke
isn't licensed to the public at all (as far as we can tell), and we
cannot distribute it -- even in our "non-free" archive.

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|Build a fire for a man, and he'll
Debian GNU/Linux   |be warm for a day.  Set a man on
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |fire, and he'll be warm for the
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |rest of his life. - Terry Pratchett


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Re: Legal questions about some GNU Emacs files

[Branden Robinson]

On Wed, Apr 30, 2003 at 01:25:34AM +0300, Antti-Juhani Kaijanaho wrote:
> On 20030429T140523-0700, Alex Romosan wrote:
> > it is because of zealots like you every revolution fails in the end.
> 
> So it is wrong for me to defend what I believe is right?

I think Mr. Romosan is expecting you to substitue his judgement for your
own.

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|It was a typical net.exercise -- a
Debian GNU/Linux   |screaming mob pounding on a greasy
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |spot on the pavement, where used to
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |lie the carcass of a dead horse.


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Re: Bug#191717: automake1.6: install-sh licensing nightmare?

[Branden Robinson]

On Fri, May 02, 2003 at 11:21:18PM -0400, Matt Zimmerman wrote:
> Package: automake1.6
> Version: 1.6.3-5
> Severity: serious
> 
> I noticed this from a discussion in #148412 about gimp's licensing)

[snip standard MIT/X11 copyright notice and license]

> Not only does automake not reproduce these notices in its documentation, as
> required, but it also automatically installs a copy of install-sh into
> automake-using packages when --add-missing is used.  The authors of these
> other software packages are almost certainly not aware of this clause in the
> install-sh license and how it affects their programs.
> 
> This problem also applies to automake1.4, and probably all other versions as
> well.

Perhaps I'm being dense, but what do you want debian-legal to do about
this?  Clearly the authors of GNU Automake should get right with
licensing, but until and unless Debian is threatened by representatives
of MIT I don't think there's a reason to panic.

This issue should be brought to the attention of the automake upstream
maintainer(s).  That's a simple courtesy.  I do not think it is Debian's
job to enforce other people's copyrights.  Our only responsibilities in
this matter are to take reasonable steps to guard ourselves and our
users from copyright infringement liability.

Is your argument that because of the nature of GNU automake, it might be
causing our users to inadvertently infringe MIT's copyright?  If so,
that is indeed more serious, and the bug should be fixed by the Debian
maintainer.

Alternatively, we could just get someone to write a work-alike of MIT's
install program, place it into the public domain, and replace the one in
GNU automake with that.  I mean, come on, it's *install*.  It ain't
hard.

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|  Mob rule isn't any prettier just
Debian GNU/Linux   |  because you call your mob a
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |  government.
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |


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Re: compatibility between Open Publication License and GNU GPL

[Branden Robinson]

On Thu, May 01, 2003 at 11:00:41AM -0700, Mark Rafn wrote:
> > | The publisher
> > | and author's names shall appear on all outer surfaces of the
> > | book. On all outer surfaces of the book the original
> > | publisher's name shall be as large as the title of the work and
> > | cited as possessive with respect to the title.
> 
> This would likely not be accepted for software.  There's currently some 
> debate (heh) on whether documentation can be considered free with this 
> kind of restriction and whether there is a category of things that are 
> not software which Debian should distribute even if they're not free.
> 
> My personal opinion is that this clause makes any work released under 
> this license non-free, and Debian shouldn't distribute it. 

Hm.  I think have said in the past that the OPL was Free if neither of
its license options were exercised.  However the above quoted text from
the license is not conditional, and is part of all instantiations of the
OPL.

I hereby retract any previous unequivocal statements I made about the
OPL's DFSG-freeness when neither license option is exercised.

I am not yet willing to make a new unequivocal statement to replace it.
My thoughts on this issue will probably hitched to the GNU FDL Cover
Texts issue, but I need more time to reflect on the subject.

-- 
G. Branden Robinson| Men are born ignorant, not stupid.
Debian GNU/Linux   | They are made stupid by education.
[EMAIL PROTECTED] | -- Bertrand Russell
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |


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Re: GFDL Freeness and Cover Texts

[Branden Robinson]

On Tue, May 06, 2003 at 02:36:34AM -0400, Anthony DeRobertis wrote:
> On Sun, 2003-05-04 at 17:29, MJ Ray wrote:
> 
> > Does the advertising clause restrict your ability to modify the original
> > work more than copyright law?
> 
> No, it restricts my ability to modify _other_ works, which, IMO, is far
> worse. Personally, I don't think the DFSG allows it, except by
> grandfathering it in (see, e.g., DSFG 9).

This is a very good argument.  I wish certain people would take the bugs
I filed in December 2001 more seriously.  :(

-- 
G. Branden Robinson| There's nothing an agnostic can't
Debian GNU/Linux   | do if he doesn't know whether he
[EMAIL PROTECTED] | believes in it or not.
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ | -- Graham Chapman


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Re: GFDL Freeness and Cover Texts

[Branden Robinson]

On Mon, May 05, 2003 at 11:16:29PM -0400, Anthony DeRobertis wrote:
> Besides, I don't think [...] the ftp masters want to become the
> Truth Police.

Who says they aren't already?

>;-)

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|  Never underestimate the power of
Debian GNU/Linux   |  human stupidity.
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |  -- Robert Heinlein
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |


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Re: various opinions on Debian vs the GFDL

[Branden Robinson]

On Wed, Apr 30, 2003 at 03:51:06PM +0200, Stephane Bortzmeyer wrote:
> On Wed, Apr 30, 2003 at 12:15:32AM +0200,
>  Henning Makholm <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote 
>  a message of 33 lines which said:
> 
> >   ?) The GFDL is not free when applied to documents if any of
> >  the "invariant" or "cover" options are exercised. 
> 
> Is it a consensus on debian-legal that a GFDL work *without* any
> Invariant or Cover is indeed free and has no problem being distributed
> in "main"?

Not quite.  This mailing list's analysis of the GFDL has revealed other,
subtler problems with the license, but I think it's safe to say that if
the FSF were willing to modify the license to rectify the "Invariant" or
"Covert Texts" restrictions in a way we'd regard as DFSG-free, they
probably wouldn't have a problem making the other much smaller changes
we'd likely request.

The FSF is standing in defense of Invariant Sections and Cover Texts on
principle, however what exactly those principles are have not been
clearly articulated as far as I can tell, are not present on the FSF/GNU
website, and appear to be different from the FSF's principles regarding
software freedom.

In my opinion, the FSF has not been completely forthcoming on these
matters.  I think we would all benefit if they would shed some light on
these matters.

-- 
G. Branden Robinson| "Why do we have to hide from the
Debian GNU/Linux   |  police, Daddy?"
[EMAIL PROTECTED] | "Because we use vi, son.  They use
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |  emacs."


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Re: work with GPL and GPL with extra note

[Branden Robinson]

On Mon, Apr 28, 2003 at 09:56:10PM +0100, Edmund GRIMLEY EVANS wrote:
> Brian M. Carlson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
> 
> > .\" The GNU General Public License's references to "object code"
> > .\" and "executables" are to be interpreted as the output of any
> > .\" document formatting or typesetting system, including
> > .\" intermediate and printed output.
> 
> > The second paragraph is what I am most concerned about. Is it possible
> > to combine a work that is pure GPL and a work that is GPL with this
> > "interpretation clause"?
> 
> It would be better if the paragraph had read "interpreted to include"
> instead of "interpreted as". As it is, an obstructive author could
> conceivably object to you embedding the documentation in a program by
> claiming that your binary is not "object code" or an "executable" in
> the special, restricted sense used in the licence. However, unless the
> copyright holder is known to be evil, I personally wouldn't worry much
> about that possibility: if they really meant to modify the meaning of
> the GPL they should have done it more clearly and explicitly.

This tells us how the copyright holder interprets the GNU GPL.  It
cannot tell us any more than that.  Until and unless a problem arises,
such as the copyright holder or an agent of his accusing a licensee of
copyright infringment, or until another copyright holder of GNU GPL
asserts that this interpretation is incompatible with his own (creating
a case where two GNU GPLed works cannot be combined), I'd say it's safe
to leave the issue alone.

FWIW, I don't see any obvious problems with the quoted interpretation.

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|There is no housing shortage in
Debian GNU/Linux   |Lincoln today -- just a rumor that
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |is put about by people who have
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |nowhere to live.-- G. L. Murfin


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Re: Legal questions about some GNU Emacs files

[Matthew Palmer]

On Wed, 7 May 2003, Branden Robinson wrote:

> On Tue, Apr 29, 2003 at 12:48:20PM +1000, Matthew Palmer wrote:
> > * Whether it is useful or not as a DFWWWDG-free item is not at issue.  If it
> > is not free as we define it, Debian will not distribute it.
> 
> ...in "main", anyway...

Hair well split.  Would you have preferred "will not be a part of the Debian
distribution"?


-- 
---
#include 
Matthew Palmer, Geek In Residence
http://ieee.uow.edu.au/~mjp16

Re: Legal questions about some GNU Emacs files

[Branden Robinson]

On Tue, Apr 29, 2003 at 05:59:31PM +1000, Anthony Towns wrote:
> You might like to consider some of the other documents accompanying
> WHY-FREE, and their relevance to emacs or Debian.
> 
>   CENSORSHIP - 1996-03-01 criticism of the Communications Decency Act
> of 1996-02, which was struck down on 1997-06-26.
>   COOKIES - undated copy of a 1987 urban legend, debunked at, eg
> http://www.topsecretrecipes.com/sleuth/sleuth3.htm
>   JOKES - GNU jokes ("What is a hackers' favorite candy?" "Gnugat")
>   LPF - 1994-02-03 exhortation to join the League for Programming
> Freedom, which has been mostly defunct since 1995
>   MACHINES - some remarks on how to build emacs on various systems
>   celibacy.1, condom.1, sex.6
> 
> Reflecting on the liklihood of something like, say, CENSORSHIP or LPF,
> being included as an invariant section in future GFDL documentation
> might be worthwhile.

It looks like RMS used to use the official GNU Emacs distribution in a
similar manner to the one in which he uses his personal webpage today.

  http://www.stallman.org/

I'll note that I find myself in sympathy with much of the material on
that webpage.  I just don't think most of it's germane to software
distribution, and I do not think it is -- neighborly -- to attach
unremovable, unmodifiable activist literature to software distributions
and call the product "free as in freedom".

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|
Debian GNU/Linux   |  Please do not look directly into
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |  laser with remaining eye.
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |


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Re: Legal questions about some GNU Emacs files

[Branden Robinson]

On Tue, Apr 29, 2003 at 09:37:13PM +0200, Jérôme Marant wrote:
> Anthony Towns  writes:
> 
> > If we decide "hey, let's not distribute them in main at all", I take it
> > you mean.
> >
> > You don't have to distribute pristine tarballs. The xfree86 upstream
> > source includes some non-free stuff, which is stripped out of the
> > .orig.tar.gz before Branden uploads it, eg.
> 
> I didn't know that.

He ain't lyin'.

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|It may be difficult to to determine
Debian GNU/Linux   |where religious beliefs end and
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |mental illness begins.
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |-- Elaine Cassel


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Re: Legal questions about some GNU Emacs files

[Branden Robinson]

On Tue, Apr 29, 2003 at 06:23:05PM -0400, Joey Hess wrote:
> Unfortunatly, it is because of the tolling rants of developers like you
> that we cannot seem to get a consensus anymore. And we seemed *so* close
> to a consensus on the FDL, and actually doing something too..

Don't despair.  I personally tend to lend developers credibility in
proportion to their contributions to the Project.  Mr. Romosan has made
2 package uploads in the past 8+ months, neither of them for
anything approaching crucial infrastructural software, and neither of
which consisted of changes that, judging by the Debian changelog,
couldn't have been done by just about one familiar with the NMU process.

Part of leadership is tackling the problematic issues and making the
tough decisions.  It sounds to me like most of the leaders of the
"debian-legal" unofficial sub-project remain very close to consensus.

Now, it might be the case that the "leaders of the debian-legal
community" aren't very representative of the ideology of the masses of
Debian developers.  If we find that is the case, then we'll be no worse
off than if Mr. Romosan managed to derail our deliberations, and the
"masses" may learn that they need to interest themselves in boring legal
issues, and participate in this mailing list, which is not closed to
anyone.

Mr. Romosan appears more interested in contributing noise than signal.
Any consensus as fragile as the one you're afraid we had, isn't worth
having.  Let's keep moving.

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|   The last Christian died on the
Debian GNU/Linux   |   cross.
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |   -- Friedrich Nietzsche
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |


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Re: Legal questions about some GNU Emacs files

[Branden Robinson]

On Tue, Apr 29, 2003 at 10:36:39AM +0300, Antti-Juhani Kaijanaho wrote:
> On 20030428T234517-0700, Alex Romosan wrote:
> > so no, debian didn't come up with the idea of free software.
> 
> Are you trolling?

It seems that he is.  :(

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|  We either learn from history or,
Debian GNU/Linux   |  uh, well, something bad will
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |  happen.
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |  -- Bob Church


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Re: Legal questions about some GNU Emacs files

[Branden Robinson]

On Tue, Apr 29, 2003 at 02:05:23PM -0700, Alex Romosan wrote:
> it is because of zealots like you every revolution fails in the end.

No, it is because of zeal that revolutions happen at all.

Most people are sheep, couch potatoes, collaborators, or wage-slaves.

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|
Debian GNU/Linux   |   // // //  / /
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |   EI 'AANIIGOO 'AHOOT'E
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |


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Re: Legal questions about some GNU Emacs files

[Branden Robinson]

On Mon, Apr 28, 2003 at 04:34:54PM -0700, Alex Romosan wrote:
> Steve Langasek <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> 
> > You have turned the DFSG soundly on its head. In a world of
> > copyrights, all works are non-free *by default*; it is only if they
> > meet certain requirements, as detailed in the DFSG, that we consider
> > them free. Are you saying that the WHY-FREE op-ed piece should be
> > considered free because the DFSG doesn't say anything about opinion
> > pieces?
> 
> _you_ have turned the DFSG on its head by taking something meant for
> software and applying it to non software.

Fine; under clause 1 of the Social Contract, we need to get all the shit
that isn't software out of Debian *right now*.

  # Debian Will Remain 100% Free Software

  We promise to keep the Debian GNU/Linux Distribution entirely free
  software.[1]

What part of the above don't you understand?

[1] http://www.debian.org/social_contract
-- 
G. Branden Robinson|Fair use is irrelevant and
Debian GNU/Linux   |improper.
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |-- Asst. U.S. Attorney Scott
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |Frewing, explaining the DMCA


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Re: Legal questions about some GNU Emacs files

[Branden Robinson]

On Mon, Apr 28, 2003 at 06:15:18PM -0500, Steve Langasek wrote:
> You have turned the DFSG soundly on its head.

Unfortunately this is pretty common.  A lot of people (just to pick an
example out of thin air, Isaac To on the debian-devel list) seem to
believe that something is Free as long as it doesn't obviously fail a
clause of the DFSG.

And such people tend to read the clauses of the DFSG more and more
narrowly until what is Free is barely distinguishable from what is
non-free.

I think we should take a stand against such cynical manipulation.
People are reading the words of the DFSG but can't hear the music of the
Social Contract.

-- 
G. Branden Robinson| You could wire up a dead rat to a
Debian GNU/Linux   | DIMM socket and the PC BIOS memory
[EMAIL PROTECTED] | test would pass it just fine.
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ | -- Ethan Benson


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Re: Legal questions about some GNU Emacs files

[Branden Robinson]

On Wed, Apr 30, 2003 at 12:37:42PM +1000, Matthew Palmer wrote:
> Nobody I've seen is trying to change the DFSG, merely modify what we apply
> it to.  Since we need something to define what we consider free in the
> non-software field, the -legal beagles (heh) have gone with the DFSG for
> now.

Full disclosure: I've proposed changing the DFSG, and first did so years
ago, back in 2000 I think.

I haven't done anything about it, but I haven't totally given up on the
idea yet, either.  I'm mostly waiting for matters to be resolved on
debian-vote that have been queued up for almost 3 years.

-- 
G. Branden Robinson| You don't just decide to break
Debian GNU/Linux   | Kubrick's code of silence and then
[EMAIL PROTECTED] | get drawn away from it to a
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ | discussion about cough medicine.


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Re: Legal questions about some GNU Emacs files

[Branden Robinson]

On Mon, Apr 28, 2003 at 11:13:51PM -0700, Alex Romosan wrote:
> there you go. you are attempting to supersede the DFSG with DFWWWDG
> without any discussion among developers or a vote.

No, you are trying to supersede clause 1 of the Social Contract
unilaterally, without a vote.

We on debian-legal are trying to work within the Social Contract as it
is written.

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|  The noble soul has reverence for
Debian GNU/Linux   |  itself.
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |  -- Friedrich Nietzsche
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |


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Re: Legal questions about some GNU Emacs files

[Branden Robinson]

On Wed, Apr 30, 2003 at 11:02:59PM -0400, Anthony DeRobertis wrote:
> 
> >   so if it isn't code, and it isn't used to generate
> >   code, or doesn't affect the build and run-time of a
> >   program, then it ain't software.
> 
> OK, now define code.

Code is anything that halts.  Let's have Alex get back to us on that
one.

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|  The noble soul has reverence for
Debian GNU/Linux   |  itself.
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |  -- Friedrich Nietzsche
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |


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Re: Legal questions about some GNU Emacs files

[Branden Robinson]

On Tue, Apr 29, 2003 at 12:48:20PM +1000, Matthew Palmer wrote:
> * Whether it is useful or not as a DFWWWDG-free item is not at issue.  If it
> is not free as we define it, Debian will not distribute it.

...in "main", anyway...

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|   The software said it required
Debian GNU/Linux   |   Windows 3.1 or better, so I
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |   installed Linux.
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |


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Re: Legal questions about some GNU Emacs files

[Branden Robinson]

On Mon, Apr 28, 2003 at 11:20:53PM +0100, Edmund GRIMLEY EVANS wrote:
> How does that follow from the definition of "free" applicable in this
> context? http://www.debian.org/social_contract#guidelines

Just to pick a nit, that's not a "definition".  It's a series of tests.

The Free Software Foundation has a fairly useful attempt at a definition
of what "freedom" is as it applies to software and, I would argue, any
creative work.

http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/free-sw.html

In the interests of full disclosure I should note that I have pondered
extending this list of freedoms for Debian's purposes.

-- 
G. Branden Robinson| That's the saving grace of humor:
Debian GNU/Linux   | if you fail, no one is laughing at
[EMAIL PROTECTED] | you.
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ | -- A. Whitney Brown


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Re: Legal questions about some GNU Emacs files

[Branden Robinson]

On Mon, Apr 28, 2003 at 03:42:24PM -0700, Alex Romosan wrote:
> what's weird is people applying the free-software concept to things
> other than software.

I don't see what's weird about it.

  # Debian Will Remain 100% Free Software

  We promise to keep the Debian GNU/Linux Distribution entirely free
  software. As there are many definitions of free software, we include the
  guidelines we use to determine if software is "free" below. We will
  support our users who develop and run non-free software on Debian, but
  we will never make the system depend on an item of non-free software.[1]

If there are things in the Debian GNU/Linux Distribution that are not
free, or are not software, then we are diluting the "100%" proportion of
our distribution that is supposed to be Free Software, and we should
remove it.

Alternatively, we can treat as much as we possibly can in the Debian
GNU/Linux Distribution as software for the purpose of determining its
freedom.

As an other alternative, we can develop a complex classification scheme
for creative works, which distinguish "software" and "documentation"
"documentation" from "manifestos", and so forth; determine whether
"freedom" is even relevant for any or all classes of creative works; if
so, develop a schema for what "freedom" means for each class of creative
works, and finally justify all this as a reasonable, obvious, and
straightforward application of the Debian Social Contract.

As yet another alternative, we can propose and vote on a General
Resolution to repeal or amend the Debian Social Contract, so that we can
do whatever we want.

[1] http://www.debian.org/social_contract

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|  Measure with micrometer,
Debian GNU/Linux   |  mark with chalk,
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |  cut with axe,
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |  hope like hell.


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Re: Proposed statement wrt GNU FDL

[Josselin Mouette]

Le mer 07/05/2003 à 08:12, Branden Robinson a écrit :
> I think before Debian puts anything in main it should remove any
> invariant sections from the work, just as we do with non-free source
> code.  I once had a big old nasty flamewar with the FTP admins that
> was tangentially related to this point, but the FTP admins and I agreed
> that having non-free source code in a package's .orig.tar.gz was
> unacceptable even if it wasn't "used for anything" and did not appear in
> any binary packages.

By removing invariant sections, don't we simply violate the GFDL ?

-- 
 .''`.   Josselin Mouette/\./\
: :' :   [EMAIL PROTECTED]
`. `'[EMAIL PROTECTED]
  `-  Debian GNU/Linux -- The power of freedom


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Re: Legal questions about some GNU Emacs files

[Branden Robinson]

On Sun, Apr 27, 2003 at 10:46:47AM +0200, Jérôme Marant wrote:
> [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Jérôme Marant) writes:
> 
> 
> >> take some time to deal with, but it's not remotely difficult.
> >
> > How should we proceed? Should we contact RMS directly?
> > Should a RC bug be opened? Note that we've been shipping theses
> > files for quite a while now.
> 
> Hmm, aren't Verbatim texts a special case? I mean that they
> cannot be considered as documentation and you're not likely
> to modify them I think.

No.  The special case is the license-which-applies-to-the-work.  Debian
has traditionally always tolerated such things being nonmodifiable.  If
we didn't, we wouldn't have much left to distribute.

Under my proposed interpretation of the DFSG, however, we could not
distribute the GNU GPL in main *except* as a
license-which-applies-to-the-work.  For a real-world case where this
matters, see the GNU Emacs Manual or the GNU C Library Reference Manual.
The entire text of the GNU GPL is marked as an Invariant Section even
though the GNU GPL itself doesn't actually have anything to do with
those works (they are licensed under the GNU FDL, and in days of old
they were licensed under what I call the "traditional GNU documentation
license", with riders implementing an early form of Invariant Section
restrictions).

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|One man's theology is another man's
Debian GNU/Linux   |belly laugh.
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |-- Robert Heinlein
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |


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Re: Legal questions about some GNU Emacs files

[Branden Robinson]

On Mon, Apr 28, 2003 at 08:39:08PM +, Brian M. Carlson wrote:
> Documentation *is* software, and therefore its licenses must follow the
> DFSG; I thought we just decided that.

Please don't exaggerate.  There is a difference between the statements:

1) Documentation *is* software; and
2) The Debian Project treats documentation as software for the purposes
   of interpreting our Social Contract and the Debian Free Software
   Guidelines.

I do not believe the former.  I do believe the latter.

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|
Debian GNU/Linux   |   If ignorance is bliss,
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |   is omniscience hell?
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |


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Re: Legal questions about some GNU Emacs files

[Branden Robinson]

On Mon, Apr 28, 2003 at 02:23:40PM -0700, Alex Romosan wrote:
> WHY-FREE is not documentation! it is a manifesto

Okay.  Would you draw us up some "Debian Free Manifesto Guidelines" and
tell us how we should relate them to the Debian Social Contract?

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|
Debian GNU/Linux   |   "Bother," said Pooh, as he was
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |   assimilated by the Borg.
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |


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Re: LPPL and non-discrimination

[Branden Robinson]

On Sun, Apr 27, 2003 at 03:57:08PM +0100, Jonathan Fine wrote:
> Henning Makholm wrote:
> > Scripsit Jonathan Fine <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> >
> >>Now to the problem.  Debian guideline 5 states "The
> >>license must not discriminate against any person or
> >>group of persons."
> >>
> >>The proposed LaTeX license defines the Current Maintainer.
> >>The license grants these person(s) privileges that are
> >>not granted to other licensees.
> 
> Some clarification.  Every purchase is also a sale.  Every
> more than is also a less than.  Every discrimination
> in favour of is also a discrimination against.

Okay.  It is perhaps too bad that the DFSG uses "discrimination" in its
pejorative sense, since the word also has a non-pejorative meaning.  If
I cannot discriminate between the roadway and pedestrians, I'd better
not be driving a car.

> > We have a clear tradition on d-l that the non-discrimination guidline
> > only means that there must be some free terms that apply to everyone.
> > It is not a problem of specific groups receive *more* freedom than the
> > norm, as long as everyone has the freedoms described by the DFSG.
> 
> I understand this to mean: provided that for the least privileged
> licensees the other guidelines are met, guideline 5 does not apply.

I think you're missing a lot of nuance here.

The Debian Free Software Guidelines, and our concept of "Software
Freedom" as protected by legal constructs like copyright licenses,
applies to "public licenses".  That is, these are grants of permission
that apply to anyone who cares to exercise them, not contracts drawn up
between two parties explicitly.

A work-as-licensed must not withhold essential freedoms from
interchangeable people.

I'll elaborate after quoting your next statement.

> > It would be absurd to consider one license less free than another solely
> > because it gives more rights to a specific group.
> 
> In my opinion, this is precisely what guideline 5 says.  More exactly,
> it says that a license is not free if it grants *less* rights to a
> person or group of persons.  And every *more* than is also a *less*
> than.

I'm sorry, but I find your extreme egalitarianism naïve.

To interpret DFSG 5 as you suggest:

1) Debian would have to classify as non-free any work with respect to
which the copyright holder or other party terminated anyone's license or
prevented its exercise, *under any circumstances*.

The GNU GPL would be non-free:

  If, as a consequence of a court judgment or allegation of patent
  infringement or for any other reason (not limited to patent issues),
  conditions are imposed on you (whether by court order, agreement or
  otherwise) that contradict the conditions of this License, they do not
  excuse you from the conditions of this License. If you cannot distribute
  so as to satisfy simultaneously your obligations under this License and
  any other pertinent obligations, then as a consequence you may not
  distribute the Program at all.

So if John Doe "cannot distribute the Program at all", by your
reasoning, he is "discriminated against", because he has "*less*
rights" than other people.

The BSD license would be non-free:

  Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
  modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions
  are met:
  [...]
  3. Neither the name of the University nor the names of its contributors
 may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software
 without specific prior written permission.

So if John Doe uses the name of the University of California to promote
his product which is derived from this software, his license is
terminated (or suspended until he cures the breach somehow, it doesn't
matter for the purposes of this argument), then, by your
reasoning, he is "discriminated against", because he has "*less*
rights" than other people who didn't use the name of the University of
California to promote products derived from the software.

2) Debian would have to forbid all multi-licensing under all
circumstances, and would have to brand any work as non-free the instance
we found out that alternative licensing had been granted by the
copyright holder to anyone else under any circumstances.

3) Debian might have to brand all software as non-free anyway, since the
copyright holder already enjoys "*more* rights" than anyone else.  So do
certain members of the U.S. government, especially federal law
enforcement personnel and prosecutors, who routinely violate all sorts
of laws in the course of their functions, and are granted immunity under
laws like the USA PATRIOT act.  Even if Debian did not distribute
anything in the U.S. and had no presence in the U.S., this would be true
because someone in the world would have "*more* rights".

Your thesis is impractical in the extreme, and presents problems
incommensurable with the legal framework of every country in which the
Debian Project distributed software.  If I truly understand your point,

Re: Legal questions about some GNU Emacs files

[Branden Robinson]

On Sat, Apr 26, 2003 at 10:00:13PM +0200, Henning Makholm wrote:
> But you're right that none of the notices you quote describe DFSG-free
> licensing terms. Feel free to join the ongoing quasiflamewar in the
> LGPL thread about the degree to which we care about that in the case
> of Stallman's essays.

s/LGPL/GFDL/

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|
Debian GNU/Linux   |   If existence exists,
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |   why create a creator?
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |


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Re: VisualBoyAdvance license

[Branden Robinson]

On Tue, May 06, 2003 at 12:17:45PM +, [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
> As a follow up to the previous discussion about the VisualBoyAdvance
> licence thing.
> 
> I have been in contact with the author of the programme and he says
> that he intends to release the whole source under the GPL. However he
> has not been able to get through to the original authors of the Snes9x
> code which parts of the emulator are based on. So I would imagine that
> he has no right to re-licence their code under the GPL. 
> 
> Is there any way we can take this forward? Other than recommending to
> the emulator author that he tries harder to contact the Snes9x
> authors?

I don't think so.  :(

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|  We either learn from history or,
Debian GNU/Linux   |  uh, well, something bad will
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |  happen.
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |  -- Bob Church


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Re: Proposed statement wrt GNU FDL

[Branden Robinson]

On Tue, Apr 29, 2003 at 03:30:26PM +0200, Henning Makholm wrote:
> Actually, I wonder whether the current application of the GFDL for
> GNU manuals is internally consistent at all.
> 
> For example, the GNU diffutils manual is licenced with the Front-Cover
> Text "A GNU Manual". Say now that I'm a FooBSD user who for some
> reason have become dissatisfied with the quality of the documentation
> for diff that FooBSD ships with (this is a hypothetical example; I
> have access to no *BSD systems and don't know anything about the
> actual state of their documentation). So I take the texinfo source for
> the GNU diffutils manual and hack upon it so that it describes FooBSD
> diff.
> 
> Now I have a manual for FooBSD diff whose license says that it needs
> to be called "A GNU Manual" on its front cover. That could be somewhat
> confusing for users - does this document describe the FooBSD or the
> GNU implementation of diff? And is this front-cover text even
> compatible with the requirement that I remove all Endorsements?
> 
> Worse yet, my FooBSD diff manual must say on its *back* cover: "Copies
> published by the Free Software Foundation raise funds for GNU
> development" which is rather meaningless as long as the FSF does not
> publish copies of the FooBSD version of the manual at all!

Another good argument against the GNU FDL.

Sorry for the AOL remark, but I'm trying to flag stuff I think should go
in our big FAQ.

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|  "To be is to do"   -- Plato
Debian GNU/Linux   |  "To do is to be"   -- Aristotle
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |  "Do be do be do"   -- Sinatra
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |


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Re: Proposed statement wrt GNU FDL

[Branden Robinson]

On Sat, Apr 26, 2003 at 01:41:27AM -0400, Glenn Maynard wrote:
> On Sat, Apr 26, 2003 at 12:24:56AM -0400, Anthony DeRobertis wrote:
> > 1) You remove the FSF's endorsement of the license which
> >is the preamble. The Debian Project has no problem with
> >this; it is certainly an author's right to refuse to
> >endorse arbitrary changes.
> 
> > So, the full terms that the GPL is distributed under, as explained on
> > the FSF website, actually comply with the DFSG.
> 
> It still contains an invariant section, though it's less severe than the
> GFDL type, as it can be removed.  I don't believe there's consensus that
> invariant sections in general are okay as long as they can be removed,
> though.

I think before Debian puts anything in main it should remove any
invariant sections from the work, just as we do with non-free source
code.  I once had a big old nasty flamewar with the FTP admins that
was tangentially related to this point, but the FTP admins and I agreed
that having non-free source code in a package's .orig.tar.gz was
unacceptable even if it wasn't "used for anything" and did not appear in
any binary packages.

In other words, invariant sections (small I, small S) are not DFSG-free,
but the removal of invariant sections from a work may be sufficient to
render it DSFG-free.

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|  "There is no gravity in space."
Debian GNU/Linux   |  "Then how could astronauts walk
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |   around on the Moon?"
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |  "Because they wore heavy boots."


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the GPL FAQ on the copyrightability of the GPL's text

[Branden Robinson]

Hello GNU folks,

Can you gentlemen disambiguate or resolve the tension between the
following statements in the GPL FAQ[1]?

"You can use the GPL terms (possibly modified) in another license
provided that you call your license by another name and do not include
the GPL preamble, and provided you modify the instructions-for-use at
the end enough to make it clearly different in wording and not mention
GNU (though the actual procedure you describe may be similar)."[2]

"In fact, the GPL is copyrighted, and its license permits only verbatim
copying of the entire GPL."[3]

The second statement appears to be slightly misleading given the first.

[1] http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html
[2] http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html#TOCModifyGPL
[3] http://www.gnu.org/licenses/gpl-faq.html#GPLOmitPreamble

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|I must despise the world which does
Debian GNU/Linux   |not know that music is a higher
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |revelation than all wisdom and
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |philosophy. -- Ludwig van Beethoven


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Re: Proposed statement wrt GNU FDL

[Branden Robinson]

On Sat, Apr 26, 2003 at 01:30:35AM -0400, Anthony DeRobertis wrote:
> Back in June of last year Branden proposed a Debian Free Content License
> which had some great ideas about endorsements. I'm not sure if he even
> finished writing a draft; I can't seem to find one. However, the
> conversation (hundreds of messages...) is in the debian-legal archives.

I never got very far along on that project, and I have no draft.

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|  Measure with micrometer,
Debian GNU/Linux   |  mark with chalk,
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |  cut with axe,
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |  hope like hell.


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Re: Bug#189164: libdbd-mysql-perl uses GPL lib, may be used by GPL-incompatible apps

[Branden Robinson]

On Mon, Apr 28, 2003 at 05:58:15PM -0500, Steve Langasek wrote:
> Any chance you'd care to comment on the underlying question of whether
> Debian should or should not accede to the FSF's claim that GPL
> modules for interpreted languages demand GPL scripts?  I believe Anthony
> and I are at an impasse; we simply disagree on the relative weight that
> should be given to various factors involved here, so no consensus is
> likely to be forthcoming between the two of us.

I've been away from the list for a few days, but using Mutt to limit the
message view to subjects including the string "interp" reveals no
messages I haven't already read.  I recall a message from you referring
to the GPL FAQ which confusingly talks about whether people can "run"
GPL-incompatible scripts with a GPLed interpreter, which only serves to
cloud the issue since "The act of running the Program is not
restricted".

Is it any help to cite the libreadline/libeditline case?  Readline is a
GPLed library authored by the FSF.  Editline is a BSD-licensed clone
(with a limited feature set) developed by people who weren't happy with
Readline's licensing.

Because the two libraries are interface-compatible, the FSF is not in a
position to forbid people from distributing code that "links" against
libreadline if that code is not licensed GPL-compatibly, because the
code could be linked against libeditline instead.[1]

(Incidentally, there appear to be at least *two* clones of Readline in
Debian:

libedit-dev - BSD editline and history libraries (development files)
libedit2 - BSD editline and history libraries
libeditline-dev - Line editing library similar to readline - developer files
libeditline0 - Line editing library similar to readline - runtime
)

So, following this reasoning, if there is a GNU BASIC interpreter
licensed under the GPL, this does not mean that Debian cannot distribute
GPL-incompatible BASIC programs in packages, because there are other
BASIC interpreters in Debian that are more liberally licensed.

Or are you wanting to restrict the problem domain to cases where an
interface innovated in a GPLed library hasn't been cloned yet?

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|The first thing the communists do
Debian GNU/Linux   |when they take over a country is to
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |outlaw cockfighting.
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |-- Oklahoma State Senator John Monks


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Re: query from Georg Greve of GNU about Debian's opinion of the FDL

[Branden Robinson]

On Thu, May 01, 2003 at 10:01:35AM +0100, Edmund GRIMLEY EVANS wrote:
> Stephane Bortzmeyer <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
> 
> > > In any event, if non-common law countries have legal frameworks that
> > > technically render Free Software as conceived by the FSF and the Debian
> > > Project impossible, 
> > 
> > Pure FUD. See my rebuke of Nathanael Nerode's message that I just
> > sent.
> 
> I think the truth is that some non-common-law countries (France?) have
> laws relating to moral rights that might make it hard or impossible to
> fully guarantee the DFSG-freedom of certain works, which may or may
> not include works that would normally be described as "software".

Now, now, he already dismissed my statement as FUD.  Don't go pointing
out that he did so incorrectly.  That just embarrasses people.  We don't
have time for closely-reasoned arguments when we're touting the
superiority of the French legal system.

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|
Debian GNU/Linux   | Music is the brandy of the damned.
[EMAIL PROTECTED] | -- George Bernard Shaw
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |


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Re: [OT] Droit d'auteur vs. free software?

[Branden Robinson]

[snip]

It looks like Republican notions of "tort reform"[1] might have a lot of
support in Europe.

[1] Before being appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court, William Rehnquist
*defined* judicial conservatism as being a technique for reading the
law such that criminal defendants and civil plaintiffs are
disadvantaged.  _The Rehnquist Choice_, John W. Dean, New York: The Free
Press, 2001.

-- 
G. Branden Robinson|I just wanted to see what it looked
Debian GNU/Linux   |like in a spotlight.
[EMAIL PROTECTED] |-- Jim Morrison
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |


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Re: [OT] Droit d'auteur vs. free software?

[Branden Robinson]

On Fri, May 02, 2003 at 08:11:02PM +0200, Henning Makholm wrote:
> It is stupid if they released their software under a free license
> without realizing what freedom means.

Well, the realization of "what freedom means" does in fact appear to be
escaping some advocates of the GNU FDL...

-- 
G. Branden Robinson| Never attribute to malice that
Debian GNU/Linux   | which can be adequately explained
[EMAIL PROTECTED] | by stupidity.
http://people.debian.org/~branden/ |


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